What a title. Oh well, if something better comes up i’ll change it. Guess not!
This morning, I wish to convey to you the importance of forgiveness in your life. Almost all of us tend to feel hurt long after someone has done us wrong, lied to us, or attempted to harm us in any way. We tell our friends and family about our experience. We think about the trespass long into our days, more often than not harboring it inside until we get home and can finally express our inner feelings. Maybe even let a thousand little things stack up until the whole mess falls over. This invariably leads to stress in the household, a place that should be an altar of peaceful solitude. A place of familial support.
If you really need to know the secret to life, our purpose in this world, it is to create dynamic change. The ether, not unlike an electrical device, responds to many sets of impulses and reacts in kind. It doesn’t discern between good or bad, but transmutes and reciprocates whatever signal it gets the most of back to its sender. Our physical, human bodies are a collection of electrically driven, impulse activated organs within a living electrolyte. When certain thought impulses fire, we move our legs to the tune of our favorite music. When we train our eyes upon the horizon to enjoy the spectacular beauty of graceful mountainside, our eyes are sending electrical impulses into our brains describing to it what we see. When another being steps on our foot, the signal of pain and anger are sent fleeting to the brain.
What impulses we send out, electrically and magnetically speaking, affect those around us. Others can literally feel when another is angry. When your heart is beating quickly, the electrical impulses throughout your body are emanating at a particular frequency. Like radio waves through the air, depending on your mood, or charge, others can feel your wavelength. Nerdy.
It is our greatest ability in life to thoughtfully choose our reactions, then.
Every day we are faced with myriad choices. When to wake up. How many minutes to devote to an activity. What food we are to eat. What exercise should play a role in our lives. How to react to a supervisor’s request. Most of the time, we as human beings are tasked to schedule and organize all aspects of our lives to meet our continually changing hierarchies of needs. Occasionally, there are those of us who break from that old routine of gene preservation and survival — and aspire to things which are greater. A powerful choice indeed.
For as long as we know it has been scripted for all animals living things to create diverse offspring with ever-broadening gene pools so that life can proceed and adapt as far and as long as possible. Life has also been mostly forensic rather than forward-seeking. Science is the art of looking back at things that are already here, asking questions as to the condition of their existence and creating logical conclusions in response. Philosophy is the art of looking forward, asking ourselves how we can use what we are today to become the beings of tomorrow. Faith lets us know we have the power within us to create the conditions we so desire, allowing us to shift our burden elsewhere so we can push forward in earnest.
Philosophy has been here or there but philosophers are few and far between depending on your definition of philosopher. Science, though more during certain civilizations rather than throughout human existence is only responsible for a rather small portion of human progress. Faith, however, has been pervasive throughout human existence. All the way back to our beginnings when we thought lightning and thunder was wrath of the gods. Definitely a common subject in many religions, it is important to forgive.
Forgiveness and mercy are two of the rewards of faith in anything. Even when the pagans of old prayed to Earth deities, it was so the gods would show mercy to their existence by rewarding them some food or other blessings. I hope that doesn’t downplay their religion, no offense intended. Faith in something higher allows a shift of burden, that someone has your back. A football player has faith in his shoulderpads and helmet to keep him safe. However — he probably prays to someone that he will win! 😉
Forgiveness is an especially powerful ability that many of us completely lack altogether. It is hard enough for us to say sorry. To forgive someone for even minor offenses sometimes is beyond the majority of us. However, if you can find the ability to forgive often, you will find that more often than not people are quick to show you their true character and stick to it, good or bad. When you can forgive, you see past trespasses and know how to avoid them in the future. When you don’t forgive, when you harbor a grudge inside, almost like a festering infection. The sickness emanates from you and makes you become distracted. You tend to avoid the people who have harmed you. You don’t go to the places you once enjoyed because they might be there. Instead of confronting the situation, lifting yourself to a higher level and forgiving the other person of whatever stupidity they may have done to you, you willingly inflict this spectre of anger and restriction into your own life.
You also cannot run from the inability to forgive. Wherever you go, like a stench cloud you will reek of unforgiveness. The bonus: it only smells to you. You think more about these people and what they did to you (most likely completely on accident) that however long they thought about that incident pales in comparison. You could be in a seething, frothing fit while the other person has so many other things going on in their life that your concern to them is less than the decision of whether to put refined sugar or Sugar in the Raw in their coffee. If you had forgiven them in the first place, it would have made the incident the very same for you.
Forgiveness gives you the ability to move on to other things in your life. It allows you to move on to things that are more important. If you didn’t go to the good dentist because you would have to see someone there or nearby, so you go to some inferior or more expensive dentist, that grudge is either costing you more money or more pain! Is that worth it? Does that even make sense?
The forgiveness formula as I understand it is 7×70 right? i keep forgiving this knucklehead for doing knucklehead things, but he keeps doing knucklehead things… How often can I keep forgiving this fool? 7 times multiplied by 70 more times? That’s 490 forgivings! (or whatever the word is.) Don’t mistake forgiveness as being completely passive, now. With forgiveness, I do believe you get the ability to explain why you feel a certain way that is the result of the trespass. This doesn’t mean you can go off on the person and let them have all the reasons all at once. Instead of just hiding in a closet saying to yourself that you forgive someone, confront the person or situation. If for instance, you have had a bad relationship in the past with someone and were an idiot and did things they didn’t deserve, why not call em up and tell em you are sorry? Why not call up the people who have done you wrong and say “Hey, I know we were idiots to each other, but I forgive you and hope you are doing ok. I hope your family is doing well! KKBAI !”
Forgiveness brings closure. When you learn to forgive, you find that it closes those open wounds that never fully heal. Those wounds sap your energy, draining you from the ability to do what you really want to in life. Forgiveness is the suture and the salve. You can finally rest assured that though there may be a scar, it has been attended to and given the proper care in the right time. It may be there to remember so that you may not repeat that mistake in the future, but no longer does it hurt you.
I recommend you make a list of those you need to forgive and/or get forgiveness from, and then do what you need to do. If you are truly willing to forgive from your heart, you will be guided by your own insight. Peace, friends!
The Cut Lip 